the catastrophe and the cure
by ms. commas and ampersands
Summary: For centuries, the Earth Kingdom has been forbidden to Lunarians due to a curse placed upon them by the first Moon Queen. After thousands of years, one princess decides it is time to break the spell... no matter what the cost.


the catastrophe and the cure  
Written for kmaikell87 at Sailor Moon Land  
by Kihin Ranno  
1/1

The Kingdom of Earth had always been forbidden. There were legends in abundance and scientific theories where those failed, but no one really knew what had happened. Endless though Lunarians were, even they were too young to remember why no one had set foot on Earth for so many centuries. All anyone truly knew for sure that the first moon queen had - for reasons lost to history - laid a curse onto the royal family. The curse had spread like a disease until the entire planet had been stricken. It had been abandoned by the rest of the galaxy ever since.

Four moon queens had come and gone since then. The fifth had been on the throne for less than sixty years - the eye blink of a hummingbird. Her daughter, Serenity VI, was in so many ways different from her predecessors. Undoubtedly, she was the best loved of all the monarch's in the Moon Kingdom's history, especially by her mother. Therefore, she was also the most protected, guarded closely by four princesses from the Inner Planets. She received the best education from the Mercurian princess, spiritual guidance from the scion of Mars, hunting and horseback riding from the Jovian heir, and companionship and the best love advice from the girl some worshiped as Aphrodite's incarnate. Indeed, she had everything she could have ever asked for.

And so it was not enough.

No myth from Venus or calculation from Mercury could satisfy her curiosity about the mystical blue planet that seemed at her threshold, yet so far out of reach. She dreamed of it constantly, imagining long extinct flowers rumored to flourish on its verdant fields. Pages of discourse barred from them by rumor and prejudice. A thousand minds that would never be known, a thousand eyes not looked upon, a thousand hands not held.

If a Moon Queen had indeed cursed them, did it not stand to reason that a Moon Princess could heal them? And since not even her Great-Grandmother had known the Terrans' crime, was it not time to release them from it? Could she not embrace the Earth and its people as her forebears had once done?

And so it was that one day, Serenity VI ventured down to Earth to see what there was to see.

Her slipper touched down on stone washed smooth by a nearby river. She had arrived at nightfall, when the moon was out as it was always easier to travel between planets when your home was on the horizon of your destination. She looked out at a forest so green it looked black. She listened to the silence.

Until she heard a twig snap.

She spun around, hands raised to defend herself if necessary. After all, her lessons with Jupiter had not been entirely without regard to her safety. She faltered when she saw not a highway robber, but a noble. And judging by the ornamentation on his armor and the scarlet cape falling from his broad shoulders, perhaps a king. Or a prince.

The moment Serenity's eyes met his, her heart seemed to grow within her breast. Venus had often discussed her many lovers and her many other loves. Serenity had never understood what it was to fall, but now she could not imagine a time when she had been ignorant. It was just as terrifying, as sickening, and as painful as Venus had described it. And just as wonderful.

His eyes scowled at her from beneath a crown of ash black hair. He cheeks here slightly sunken despite his muscular frame, a cause of the disease no doubt. Perhaps that was also why he was so pale, paler even than her. But despite these imperfections, she thought he was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen. Her eyes watered now that she had seen him, and she cursed her ancestor for her misguided cruelty.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice rough as if from screaming. "Where did you come from?"

Serenity self-consciously touched the crescent that marked her brow. In the dark, she doubted he could see, and she did not want to reveal herself just yet. She had no idea how hostile Terrans would be towards her kind. "I... my name is Titania," she fumbled, pulling a name from one of her favorite fairy stories. "I'm lost."

"Very lost," he growled, almost like the wolves that roamed free on the field of Saturn. But she doubted that he would answer to the Saturn King if he were an animal. He seemed too... wild. "These woods are my domain."

"I beg your pardon, good sir," she said with a bow, making proper obeisance. "I wandered from the path and do not know where I am. Would you be kind enough to tell me who you are and where I find myself?"

He studied her with a hunter's eyes. She shivered despite the warm summer night. She had never been in danger before; she found she liked it. "Endymion. _Prince_ Endymion."

She drank in his name like wine brewed from grapes plucked at twilight. He moved forward with a kind of liquid grace. A black unicorn whose territory had been breached. "You are in what was once Elysian."

The name sounded familiar. Something from legend? A hint at true history? "What once was?"

Endymion continued to glare; his caution would not abate, despite how harmless she appeared. After all, she carried no sword. But she had her own defenses. "Have your parents taught you nothing of manners or history, foolish girl?"

She bowed again; she had forgotten herself, unused to speaking to someone unfamiliar and at her station. With her bearing, she could not pretend to be a poor maid, but she could easily pretend at being a lower member of the aristocracy. She had seen enough of them scrape at her mother's feet to know how they acted. "My apologies, your majesty. I am all alone and frightened; it does make one lose one's head."

For some reason, he found this funny. His laugh was brusque, rough and almost churlish. She remembered Jupiter's stories about kissing her family's dragon tamer and how his stubble had felt against her cheek. Serenity wondered if this prince's jaw would smooth or not.

"Your majesty?"

Endymion's chuckles subsided. "Alone in my woods, many are liable to... lose their heads."

For a moment, Serenity longed for Mars, if only to provide her with a piece of sharp wit. But it was only for a moment. Serenity would not have wanted to share this man with Mars's dark beauty, or with anyone else for that matter.

"Elysian was the Golden Kingdom of Earth, hundreds and thousands of years ago." For the first time, he softened, his eyes growing wistful. He spoke as if he had once lived there, so clear were the stories told about it. Serenity envied his people for their longer memories. "It was the most beautiful place you could imagine. The sun burned brighter for us there. Fields of gold and green. And roses... so many roses." He remembered himself, or to be more correct, he remembered her. "But that was before. Before the curse befell us."

"Yes, that is why I have come," Serenity said, her excitement betraying her. She regretted her haste and wished she could take it back. Venus had always told her she would be worthless at politics and subterfuge; here was proof that she was right.

To her surprise, Endymion did not bat an eyelash. In fact, he seemed more disinterested in her than before. "Yes, I had suspected."

Serenity's mouth fell open a little in her confusion. "You... you did? But how could-"

He moved faster than any human possibly could have done. He was faster than the wind, faster than her eyes could comprehend. He rushed her like the untamed wolf in her imagination. He slammed her back against the bark of a tree, pinning her arms at her sides. In her delirium, all she could think for a moment was that his hands were cold as snow.

"I could hear your heart beating from the other side of the forest," he snarled. "My men would have been upon you had you not landed in the heart of my territory. This is my land, and you are mine to dispose of." He laughed again. She cursed herself for the heat it sent searing between her legs. "I knew you must be from up there, but to think... a monarch from the moon." He brushed her bangs from her forehead. Her lips quivered at his touch. "And so young. A princess, if I'm not mistaken."

Serenity struggled to keep her head; it felt as though she was drowning in senselessness. She was clearly in danger, and all she could think of was kissing him until her lips were bloody and raw. "How... how could you have seen? It's so dark."

"Don't you know anything?" he taunted. "Thanks to you, we hear every sound uttered for miles. We see in the dark. We smell... blood."

Her mind raced. She had never cared for stories of terror, but Mercury of all people had a kind of morbid fascination with them. She remembered reading over her shoulder one day, a decade ago. A story of men who were not alive, but corpses that walked. They shunned the sun for it burned them. They were constantly hungry for the life that had been stolen from them, and they slaked that thirst with the blood of those that still drew blood.

"Vampire," she breathed, realizing for the first time that he could not. "That was the curse in the story. She cursed you to... to a living death."

"Oh, so you've forgotten?" he spat. "How predictable. Ashamed of your sins, you bury them in memory. Disgusting."

She prayed he did not find her disgusting, though she hated herself for caring.

"What did you come for?" he demanded, his fingers tightening on her forearms. He bruised her, and all she wanted was him to be closer. "To make sure that the curse still held? Am I proof enough for you?"

"I came... I came..." Why couldn't she speak? Tear herself away? Fight back as she had been taught and with the powers of her birthright? Why had she left herself so helpless when she most needed help? And why did she suspect that she would have spurned it if it came?

"It doesn't matter," Endymion growled. "In your ignorance, you have done us a favor and done yourself in. Your ancestor cursed us with this... _disease_, but she also told us the cure."

He bared his fangs for the first time.

"The blood of her descendants."

He fell upon her with a predator's grace. He tore at her throat like a savage, and she felt her blood pour from the wound. Its heat filled his open, greedy mouth.

She gasped in pain and alarm, but her body continued to betray her. She buried her fingers in his hair and pulled his face closer to her flesh. She seemed to burn with desire, and she could not catch her breath. She arched her back into him, despite the agony he put her through. Her body jerked; her hips undulated; she cried out in ecstasy, knowing it was her death.

His hands grew warmer against her rapidly cooling skin. She felt his fangs change within her open cut. She knew that he was becoming human again. She wondered, when he was no longer a monster, if he would hate himself for what he had done. She wondered if her people would make war with his. She wondered if her mother would obliterate the planet or desecrate the first Serenity's grave.

But at least she had done what she'd come to do.


End file.
